James Mill was a political philosopher, Scottish historian, psychologist, economist, educational theorist, and legal and political penal reformer. He was born on 6 April 1773 in the United Kingdom and died on 23 June 1836. He One of his famous works was the ‘History of British India’. He published this book in 1817. Mill was the first writer who divided Indian history into three periods. He had never traveled to India and didn’t even know any Indian language. Mill had the opinion that all Asian societies were at a lower level of civilization than Europe. In his book, Mill described the religion, law, history, climate, art, and literature of India. Mill believed that economic theory and philosophy, along with social awareness, should play a role in politics and will shape public policy.

Mill divided Indian history into three major periods named as Hindus, Muslims, and British. He didn’t include Christianity in any of his periods. He had his own vision and reasons for doing so. According to him, the Hindu period was stagnant and unchanging. He believed that Hinduism promotes superstition. Whereas Muslim period was defined as tyranny and oppression. He wrote, Muslims exploited Hindus. In the third and final period, the British period, he believed that Britishers brought progress and modernization to India. Mills style of writing was plain and clear.

Mill believed that there was a lot of religious intolerance, caste discrimination, and superstitious practice in Indian society, while the era before British rule was one of darkness, superstition, and ignorance. He felt that only the British could bring happiness, enlightenment, and development to India, and only European culture, art, and law could uplift the Indian culture.

Two years after the release of his book, in 1819, he was appointed as an official in India House, during Mill’s 17 year tenure in the British government. Mill was a Member of Parliament, and he had also worked for the East India Company. He was occupied in the defense of East India Company during controversies.

Mill's periodization fails to justify the culture, heritage, diversity, political, social, and cultural developments of Indian civilization. Also, Mill’s periodization doesn’t define the indigenous history and dynasties of India that existed before the Muslim and British rule. Before the British came to India, Hindus and Muslim dictators ruled the country. Mill criticized Hindus and Hinduism a lot. He called Hindus rude and backward.

Mill lacked a lot of information because of insufficient knowledge of Indian civilization. Mill had never visited India, and he didn’t even feel the need to visit India before writing anything about India. Mill gathered the information about India's civilization from articles, books, and the vast amount of documentation that existed in the European language, as mill didn’t have any knowledge about India or its language. The History of British India, written by James Mill, is undeniably a work based on Mill's perception and imagination. Mill was widely criticized by many historians for his theories of Indian history.